My process in creating a commissioned whimsical family portrait painting

* 2nd Post from over on my TanColeArtist.com site

So I thought it might be nice as my first proper blog post on here, to make it one that share’s a little of my intuitive painting process, creating a whimsical family portrait commission painting ~ “Family Friends Menagerie”. Drawing out the essence of a persons features, spirit and soul. So here we go…

I was asked to create a large whimsical piece of three daughters/sisters, with their favourite cuddlies depicted, as well as their favourite farm animals. My client grew up on a farm and her daughters experience farm and bush life. The brief was for pastel colours in peach, lemon, soft grey and mint green ~ gorgeous! The home/room the painting was to reside in is just stunning! My client has a creative flare for interior design with a beautiful fresh white peacefulness to her home having been created.

Being an Intuitive Artist/person, I asked heaps of questions to help me really soak in the essence of each child. I requested photo’s of them and spent several hours sketching their beautiful little faces to both appreciate and capture the unique features that make these gorgeous souls shine like the individuals they are. (My early years as a budding artist mostly involved studying faces and creating portraits of family members, friends, superstars and super heroes!)

Whilst sketching, I kept in mind that I was not trying for perfection and that I would need to pull back to whimsy afterwards.

Here are a couple of the sketches I made of each girl.

These pics were taken at night and on my iPad, so not the best quality, however you get the picture!

I continued doing a few more sketches of each girl, playing with it and having fun. Then I set about playing with paints and colours…more fun!

You can view a video over on my Art Community website (Soul Song Creating), here. It was a video log that I did as part of a challenge to Vlog everyday in February, created around the time I was about to commence this commissioned painting. Unfortunately I over edited the first part so all the colour is whitewashed out! (note: you can subscribe to my other blog and gain access to an extended version of the video where you can see me painting the full canvas intuitively)

After experimenting with paint/colour merging, I prepared my studio…

I then set about laying down marks and colour runs onto the canvas.

I just LOVE the first layers down onto the canvas! Something quite visceral in reaction occurs…a feeling of yummy joyful excitement if you will!

I then started to paint in figures…

Another part I love is seeing the painting start to take shape and the faces come into being. The painting is talking to me by now.